The IndiGo flight cancellations left commuters with what CNBC TV18 called a ‘crisis never seen before’.
It also managed to give the Narendra Modi government a very bumpy ride on television news, as anchor after anchor got into a flap over how IndiGo ‘gamed’ the Centre and the regulatory body, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), besides lakhs of commuters (News X).
News channels, which habitually give the Modi government an easy passage on air, went after the authorities and strongly championed the public interest in a way we don’t often see.
Republic TV was the harshest of them all: “The (civil aviation) minister has done a bad job,” said prime time anchor Arnab Goswami. “The government must take some responsibility.”
Other Republic TV anchors were equally annoyed with the Centre: “The government cannot wash its hands of IndiGo’s mess,” said one of the anchors Monday afternoon.
The channel then highlighted an August “warning” by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture on the implementation of Flight Duty Time Limitations (FDTL) and asked how IndiGo got away with its laxity.
Times Now was on the government’s tail, too: “Govt works for IndiGo or for India?” it asked.
Navika Kumar, the lead anchor on Times Now, cornered Minister of Civil Aviation K Ram Mohan Naidu, Tuesday morning: “Not one head has rolled, no action has been taken,” she thundered so loudly her spectacles nosedived. “If you give me an assurance that you are worried about the safety (of passengers), nobody will believe you,” she added sternly. “Was the minister and the regulator sleeping on the wheel?”
Throughout the crisis, TV news channels, anchors and reporters repeatedly asked one question: why did the DGCA allow IndiGo a one-time exemption from FDTLs? “Why was leeway given to IndiGo?” asked CNN-News 18.
No one had an answer.
IndiGO’s monopoly
The direct demand for accountability from the government was followed by more subtle criticism.
TV news channels persistently made the allegation that the IndiGo’s ‘flight fiasco’ was ‘pre-planned’ (India Today), that the public had been held ‘hostage’, the government ‘arm-twisted’ (Times Now) and ‘blackmailed’ by the airline (News X).
The airline, and its chief executive officer (CEO) Pieter Elbers, were attacked for their “inability to deliver” and for their “systemic incompetence”, as NDTV 24×7 called it.
News channels reminded viewers—and by extension the government and IndiGo—that it had been given a “whole year” to adjust to the new FDTL rules.
Aviation expert Captain S Panesar accused the airline of “conspiracies” and Captain G S Randhawa, formerly at DGCA, suggested there was “much more to it than meets the eye” (CNN-News 18).
With over 65 per cent shareholding of the air travel market, IndiGo was accused of a ‘monopoly’. Along with Air India, which owns a 13.6 per cent market share, it was running a “duopoly”, alleged news channels. Why?
The government wasn’t always named, but read between the lines, and the insinuation is clear: How had a ‘monopoly’ or ‘duopoly’ been allowed by the authorities? What was the government, the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the DGCA doing? Why did they allow themselves to be held to ransom by the airline?
Why indeed?
Embarrassment for India
IndiGo had grounded passengers, and the news media made sure it didn’t fly off into the sunset.
Newspapers such as The Times of India, The Indian Express, and The Hindu wrote strongly-worded editorials against the airline’s behaviour. Television news channels did more: through constant video footage from airports around the country and interviews with stranded passengers, it did a show-and-tell of the situation on the ground.
The most telling visual was of luggage in large numbers lying at airports like Mumbai, waiting to be returned to passengers whose flights had been cancelled (Times Now, Republic TV, News Nation).
Regular flight cancellation numbers were telecast each hour or so—‘500 flights cancelled’ was a Monday morning figure on Zee News. Helpless commuters at the airline counter was the other telling visual—a foreign passenger climbing onto the IndiGo ticket counter at Mumbai airport, screaming, must be the most damning and damaging of all.
“Disrupting lives and embarrassing India in front of the entire world,” said an anchor on NDTV 24×7.
Interviews with passengers were saddening. From Mumbai to Kolkata, from Bhopal and Gwalior to Lucknow and Guwahati, news channels like News Nation spoke to people waiting to take off, to collect luggage – some of them just wondering what the next step was.
“We know nothing, there’s no information,” said one person. “There was no cancellation in advance, I have a boarding pass and now I am told it is cancelled,” said another.
“What shall we do?” asked a tearful lady, stranded in Mumbai (News 24). “Now they are asking for extra charge.”
“There’s no announcement, online is silent, nobody tells us anything,” said a man at Guwahati airport to Times Now. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee summed up the situation in one short sentence: “It’s a disaster.” (India Today).
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Lucky passengers
IndiGo’s troubles increased with the escape of the Luthra brothers — the owners of the Romeo Lane Shack in Goa, where a fire killed 25 people — on an IndiGo flight to Phuket, Thailand.
News channels pointed out the irony: while lakhs of IndiGo passengers were stuck at airports, Saurabh Luthra and Gaurav Luthra managed to flee the country – on an IndiGo flight.
“Who helped the owners get away so fast?” asked CNN-News 18.
The author tweets @shailajabajpai. Views are personal.
(Edited by Ratan Priya)